Children's Hospitals Today - Summer 2024 - 6

ROUNDS / FIRST PERSON
Life to limbs
A disaster in a doctor's home country led to a multinational initiative to help victims.
BY YONCA BULUT, MD
and others at ground zero, I realized there would be a gap in
the care for the children who needed amputations. They would
require care for more than just a month or two, and it would
need to be comprehensive-they lost not only their limbs but
also their homes and their families.
Working with a university in
Read CHA's Blueprint
for Pediatric-Specific
Readiness in Pandemics
and Disasters at
childrenshospitals
.org/blueprint.
Türkiye, along with colleagues at
UCLA Health and others, we developed
follow-up care for children who
underwent amputation. This was not
our area of expertise, and the process
W
hen a series of earthquakes in 2023 devastated Türkiye
(formerly called Turkey), I was packing for a trip to visit
my parents in Ankara, the capital of the country
and my hometown. I looked forward to catching
up with family and friends over tea and more tea
(black tea, of course, the only real tea according
to us Turks).
But at 4 a.m. in the dead of winter, two 7.8-magnitude
earthquakes and hundreds of seismic
aftershocks rocked a region in central Türkiye
the size of Indiana. More than 50,000 people died,
and 13 million were affected.
The horror of the disaster is difficult to fathom.
of prosthetic recovery is highly complicated-encompassing
social, psychological, and monetary aspects in addition to
the basic difficulty of finding the precise prosthesis for each
child given their needs now and in the future. It became a fulltime
job for months, and our group grew from a few people to
more than 100 between the U.S. and Türkiye. This ultimately
led to the Children Wellness Center, a sustainable medical
support system providing physical therapy, counseling, educational
scholarships, and research. As a result, 147 children
have received prosthetics so far, along with rehabilitation,
psychotherapy, and scholarships.
My experience led me on a mission in the U.S. to help train
" IF EVEN A SINGLE
CHILD RECEIVES
BETTER CARE IN A
DISASTER BECAUSE
OF IT, I'LL BE HAPPY. "
Children were pulled from the rubble of enormous
buildings, collapsed like accordions. Their legs were
caught in the grip of concrete slabs, pieces of a bank or school
or house flung down by the seismic tremor. Some were frozen
with hypothermia, and some rescued with lost limbs. More
than 200 underwent amputations.
Doctors from all over the country, including my hometown,
flocked to the site to help. Other countries and organizations
sent aid. As I urgently talked to my network of intensivists
non-pediatric physicians to provide pediatric emergency care
and to raise awareness on the consequences
when hospitals are not adequately prepared
for a disaster. The majority of children will be
cared for in adult emergency rooms, and as we
know, children have unique physical, mental,
and social needs. Treating children requires
specialized training and equipment that must
be accounted for in disaster plans. I know children's
hospitals and pediatric organizations are
addressing this in impactful ways. I wanted to
make a small difference in my little corner, so I
organized the Society of Critical Care Medicine's
crisis management course that provides hands-on training
to all levels of providers. If even a single child receives better
care in a disaster because of it, I'll be happy.
Yonca Bulut, MD, is the medical director of UCLA Mattel
Children's Hospital's pediatric intensive care unit.
Tell your story. Email magazine@childrenshospitals.org.
6
CHILDREN'S HOSPITALS TODAY Summer 2024
Children's Hospitals Today - Summer 2024

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